They say students lack the motor skills or can't pay attention in class because of tablet overexposure

A group of UK teachers are urging parents to limit their children's time on tablets and other technology, as they claim a rising number of young students lack the motor skills needed to play with building blocks while older students are unable to take written exams with pen and paper.

According to The Telegraph, the Association of Teachers and Lecturers wants parents to turn off the Wi-Fi at night before bed so students get a good night's sleep instead of playing on tablets all night.

The association claims that younger students as young as three or four can swipe on an iPad screen, but have little or no dexterity in their fingers to use building blocks.

As for the older students, the association said their attention spans are limited in the classroom due to overexposure to technology. They further claimed that these students can't implement the skills they read in their textbooks, but have exceptional technical skills when it comes to consumer electronics.

“It is our job to make sure that the technology is being used wisely and productively and that pupils are not making backward steps and getting obsessed and exhibiting aggressive and anti-social behaviours,” said Mark Montgomery, a teacher from Northern Ireland.

“In the same way we can use a brick to either break a window or build a house, digital technology can be used for good or bad, and teachers can and should help their pupils make positive choices so they have positive experiences.”

The teachers say many children born with an iPad in their hands and overuse the devices are more likely to lack non-tech skills as simple as writing with pen and paper.

This seems to be an issue in other parts of the world as well. Back in 2012, it was reported that children in South Korea are especially prone to internet addiction, and that the dangers of tech addiction would be taught in schools.

In the U.S., however, tablets like the iPad are being deployed in many school districts to advance tech skills.

The usual reclaimer77 moving goalpost. First you claim that no other country has free speech as a right. Then when I gave an example, you come back with a case where this right was abusively supressed, so I show that the same thing happens in your so-called free country. Now you are changing the requirements, so that my examples are not valid but yours somehow still are?

OK, we'll play by your rules. You state that only the US believes that these rights come from a higher power.

The Canadian Charter starts out like this:

quote: Whereas Canada is founded upon principles that recognize the supremacy of God and the rule of law:

Sounds an awful lot to me that the rights therein were considered to be granted by a power higher than government, just like in your constitution.

Sure, there have been abuses, but that doesn't make your statement that only the USA has the right of free speech to be any more true, regardless of your backpedalling and rule changing.

While we are on the subject of free speech violations in the USA:

quote: In the eeriest parallel to my experiences in martial law Poland, on two consecutive evenings the police inexplicably deemed assemblies of people peacefully gathered in a large, grassy University of Pittsburgh plaza to be “unlawful” and ordered everyone to disperse immediately. Police used an “LRAD” (first-ever civilian use of a military sonic weapon that can cause permanent hearing loss), shot pepper spray into dormitory stairwells, and fired rubber bullets and beanbags at fleeing students and curiosity seekers.

When the Chretien government used pepper spray on G20 protesters here in Canada, the nation was outraged and that was one of the events that helped bring down his government and force him to resign. Yet much more dangerous weapons were used against protesters in your country and you probably didn't even know about it.

America is turning into a police state, and you have the gall to declare it more free than the rest of the world?

quote: First you claim that no other country has free speech as a right.

I never said that.

quote: America is turning into a police state, and you have the gall to declare it more free than the rest of the world?

I never said that.

I'm getting some creepy Nationalistic vibe from you over this, when it was never my intention to declare my country was the 'bestest evar' or whatever you have in your head. If I've somehow offended you over my quite innocent statement, I guess I'm sorry.

I'm as concerned as anyone over the direction my country has gone in lately. However I still believe in the ideals it's founding was based on. And I am NOT going to apologize for that!